My webpage on Bay Area hikes: Bay Area hikes (It has a map of the Bay so you can locate the park)

Hardcore Hikers who are doing the one-way hike

Christof (sure)

Ksenya (sure)

Mihai (sure)

piero (sure)

Shashikant (sure)

Softcore Hikers who are doing the round-trip hike

Aurelie (sure)

Sofia (sure)

Karen (sure)

Elaine (sure)

Oni (sure)

COMMUNICATING

Cellular phones do not work in the forest (thankfully).
Shashikant has four walkie talkies.
I have three.
I am giving two of mine to Aurelie. Aurelie will give one to whoever else
wants it of her group.
Use channel 13.

CARS

Softcore hikers (five people) drive in two cars (Elaine's car and Shashikant's car, the two biggest cars we have) to Waddell Beach.

In the evening we'll need to drive Ksenya back to Portola Redwoods Park to
rescue her car, but i can do that once we get home.

My guess is that it will take between one hour and two hours to get to Waddell Beach. It is about 100 km.

Needless to say: DO NOT INVITE ANYONE ELSE or we won't fit in the cars.

WEATHER

The
weather forecast
has dramatically improved. It is supposed to be sunny
in the afternoon.
The weather forecast says 19 degrees, which is nice and warm, but count on
chillier temperatures, like 15 degrees, because you will soon enter a forest.

AUrelie has mosquito repellent for everybody, if needed.

Directions for hardcore hikers

Meet at my place at 5am or just sleep at my place or let's camp

We start hiking just before sunrise.

Trail: follow me

Bring a flashlight and an emergency blanket, besides food and drinks and the usual stuff

Directions for softcore hikers

Meet at my place at 11am

Waddell Beach and Rancho del Oso (same place, one across from
the other) are located between Pescadero and Santa Cruz on Hwy 1.
Directions in general:
click here.
Directions from my place (Redwood City):

Drive south on 280 one exit

Turn right into 84 west

Drive all the way to the ocean (hwy 1)

Turn left onto Hwy 1 south

Keep driving south past Ano Nuevo for about 10'

Slow down when you see San Mateo/Santa Cruz County bordersign and/or signs that you are entering Big Basin

You should see a sign for Waddell Beach on your right and for Rancho del Oso on your left

If you get to Davenport, you went too far: go back

Waddell Beach has a huge parking lot

Across the street there is room for 5-6 cars in front of the gate of Rancho del Oso

The total distance from Redwood City to Waddell Beach is 80 km. According to Maponus, it should take 1h 35'.

Walk through the gate

The first 1 km is alphalt

Then you get to Rancho del Oso with a ranger station (buy a map for $3 if you need one)

Follow the trail "Skyline to the Sea" and ignore signs that ask
hikers to use another trail. Just keep walking noth on Skyline to
the Sea. (Ignore rangers too)

If you want to get to Berry Falls, at some point there are signs.
If hardcore hikers are still alive at that point, we'll be
visiting the Berry Falls too, so that could be a nice place to meet.
If you get to Berry Falls and want more, keep walking upstream on the
Sunset trail. After a few minutes you will get to
Silver Falls and to Golden Cascade. Again, we should be coming down that trail.

I estimate hardcore hikers will enter Big Basin around 3pm, reach Berry Falls around 5pm and reach the beach around 7pm

Please remember that we need room for 5 hardcore hikers in the
cars (plural) that will be parked at Rancho del Oso.
(This would not be the first time that friends show up to pick us
up with only one car completely full of people...)